Insanity's Finest
by Flying Penguinz
Summary: A death threat is sent to Claire by a mysterious vampire no one has seen before. Will this stranger be able to complete his mission, or will Morganville and all of its residents go up in flames?
1. A Demand

Claire woke up to the sound of her phone vibrating on her nightstand. She mumbled something incoherent and brushed hair out of her eyes as she peered through the dark to see the screen lit up and illuminating things close to it: a hairbrush, lip balm, and a silver-coated stake. Claire reached out and opened her cell, squinting at the harsh glow.

"_Meet me at the crossroads of mason and howe immediately_"

Myrnin.

"_Now_ what?" she hissed to the quiet room. Within the past week, he'd been texting her more and more often and she, quite frankly, was getting sick of his constant nagging.

"_Claire, pick up some doughnuts._"

"_Claire, I've just discovered a new movie with this Lionardo Decapitato in it._"

"_I've found you the perfect Halloween costume, Claire. The last six I showed you were horrendous compared to this one._"

Claire, nearly completely awake, got out of bed, dressed, and wrote a note to Shane which she stuck under the crack of his door.

After pocketing the silver stake on her nightstand and her cellphone, she left the Glass House as quietly as she could while finger combing her hair—the best she could do in the limited time provided—and started down the silent sidewalk.

"_Claire_."

She shrieked and spun around too quickly, her feet entangling themselves in one another. She started to fall but cold, pale arms caught Claire around her waist and hoisted her back up onto her feet. She tried to shout, but her mouth was covered by long, slender fingers.

"_Jesu_, Claire, you'll wake the whole neighborhood," Myrnin said in greeting as he removed his hand from Claire's mouth and slowly released her from his grasp. His hair shone in the moonlight and his face was white while his eyes looked pitch black. He was in an old sea rover ensemble with his favorite pirate boots that were starting to look worn in places.

Her heart was still pounding. "I thought you said _meet me_," Claire whispered harshly.

"I _did_," he said, taking her wrist in his hand and leading her toward the end of the block. "You hadn't arrived quickly enough for my taste, so I came to get you. And, besides," he said calmly and waving vaguely toward the darkness, "there are _things_ out here tonight."

Claire looked behind her into the dark where a vampire in an old, billowy red shirt seemed to be following them, walking on the sidewalk a little ways behind them. He flew off the cement and into a clump of shrubbery when Claire's eyes met his. His were lit up like a cat's at night, reflecting the little light that came from a streetlamp a few yards away. Claire felt the blood drain from her face and her hands grow numb. She tore her gaze from his and stepped closer to Myrnin. "Myrnin," she said, standing on tiptoe to try and mumble it in his ear, "there's someone behind us. In the bushes."

He waved his hand dismissively. "I know, I know. That's why we need to get where we're going _quickly_." His strides were confident, but he walked fast enough to make Claire sure he knew there was danger. And yet, his pace omitted something like… _authority?_ Like a you-can't-bite-me-I'm-Myrnin kind of walk?

They turned left off of Lot Street and walked for a few more terrifying minutes, Claire glancing over her shoulder every few steps. The red-shirted vampire was still following them, but never got within a twenty-foot radius.

They were walking, when suddenly Claire felt something brush past her and Myrnin lifted her off her feet and swung her to his other side in a flash. It took her a moment to catch her balance; Myrnin kept a hand around her to keep her steady.

"What was _that_?" she snapped.

"You were going to trip over that crack," Myrnin replied easily, pointing behind them at an exceptionally large crack in the sidewalk as roots from a tree were pushing themselves up and out into the night, creating a death trap for anyone who couldn't see where they were going. Claire knew that funding for public facilities was low in Morganville, but not _that_ low.

"Thanks."

The darkness crept back around them and uneasiness filled the pit of Claire's stomach again. She looked behind them again to see the vampire in the red shirt, but he was gone.

_I'm safe with Myrnin_, she kept repeating to herself. _I'm safe with him._

But, really, she wasn't so sure.

A few blocks later, they were reaching the intersection of Mason and Howe where one lone, dilapidated streetlamp was lit. Its orange light flickered. She was too busy looking behind her, watching the vampire to notice Amelie's presence in the middle of the street. Amelie—and her usual company of guards.

When the vampire following Claire and Myrnin saw Amelie and her crew, he melted back into the shadows and Claire could hear his quick footsteps muffled by the grass that indicated his hasty flight.

Amelie was wearing a simple suit with a pencil skirt made out of a soft blue material. Her pale hair was up in an easy bun. Her face was completely smooth; the only sign of her irritation was a raised brow and her lips that were stretched into a thin line. If Myrnin's sober actions hadn't convinced her that this situation was severe, Amelie's expression did.

Claire looked at the circular wall the guards had formed around Amelie. Amelie beckoned to the two and Claire and Myrnin quickened their pace, walking through the wall of bodies that opened up to them.

Once the circle closed around them, Amelie tilted her head slightly to something on the street. Orange light fell onto what Amelie was looking at, and when Claire saw it, she felt her stomach drop.

Carved into the street like words etched onto a tombstone read:

_Dammi __Claire __o bruciare._

Her name was in it.

"Myrnin?" she asked, staring at the words carved into the street tar.

"It's Italian," Amelie said.

"'_Give me Claire or burn_,'" Myrnin translated.

Claire's heart skipped a beat and proceeded to pound at an alarmingly fast pace. There were a lot of vampires in Morganville that disliked Claire for being Amelie's…. Well, 'favorite' wasn't exactly what she was looking for. There were also a lot of humans that would want to hurt her, but none that she thought would take the risk of carving such a message on the street. Frank and his cronies, perhaps. But Frank was dead—without their leader, Frank's followers were as harmless as a toothless bulldog.

"What did it?" Claire asked quietly as the clouds rolled in, hiding the moon from sight.

Myrnin's face was swathed in the orange streetlamp light. He stood stock still and out of the corner of his eye, he looked at Claire. "If by 'what' you mean _vampire_ or _human_, I'd say vampire. No human would have the gall to vandalize public property at such a late hour in the night." His gaze went to the deep indentations of the letters in the tar.

Amelie stood there, looking into the night beyond her guards. "We must have it paved over," she said. "No one else can see this."

"Agreed," Myrnin said. He and Amelie shared a look that Claire could not even _begin_ to understand. Amelie seemed to approve of whatever information they weren't including Claire in. Myrnin broke off the exchange and seemed to pull himself together.

He bent down and sat cross-legged near the message and traced the words with his forefinger. His eyes narrowed and he picked something small off the ground near the C in_ Claire_.

"What is it?" Claire asked.

Myrnin held it up to the light to be sure. "A fingernail."

Amelie dropped her ladylike act and scoffed. "They scratched it into the tar without tools." She sighed. "Eloquence these days—_inexistent_." Claire really thought that was _not_ what Amelie should be focusing on right now.

Myrnin nodded his head in agreement. "And the script is practically unreadable. The vampire is obviously quite young; an older one would have worried more about the legibility of the words whereas this one certainly did not. The handwriting, I would say, is…. Well, not defined by an era. Perhaps made last century?"

Amelie surveyed it and said to Myrnin, "Exactly what I had been thinking. I've dealt with enough paperwork to tell."

Out in the night, far beyond the reach of the streetlamp's rays, someone cackled. It threw Claire off entirely because she had heard that laugh before. She'd heard it when Myrnin was insane—when he found amusement in the darkest of things. It was a laugh full of mania.

Claire looked behind her again, but all she could see were the backs of the guards. And she kept telling herself that she was safe.

"Myrnin," Amelie said, her tone serious, "you'll take Claire to your laboratory and keep her there for her safety. Leave the portals open so as to provide for emergency evacuation if necessary. You have your cellular device, do you not?"

Myrnin felt the pockets in his pants, coming up with nothing. He felt his ballooning sleeves. He took off his boots and shook them out. It was quite a show. Finally, he just looked confused. "Well, I _thought_ I did. I suppose I must have left it at home."

"I want that on so that I may contact you if I come across any leads on this—story. Claire, do you have yours?"

Claire reached into the pocket she usually kept her cellphone in, but it was empty. "I—I swear I put it in my pocket." She put her hand on her other pockets, but the only thing she could find was the silver stake she'd brought.

Myrnin jumped in before Amelie could say anything. "Never fear, Amelie, I've my little hand device at the laboratory and, if needed, we can use the portals to get Claire's as well."

Amelie eyed Myrnin with what seemed to be suspicion, and Claire didn't blame her; she wasn't feeling all too sure herself Myrnin was being completely honest with them.

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	2. Prank Calls

The strumming of a guitar woke both Shane and Eve just after dawn that Friday morning. They headed downstairs together in their pajamas looking like a sleepy mess. Eve curled up next to Michael on the floor who was producing the melodious music and Shane went into the kitchen to make coffee.

Michael stopped playing suddenly and rested his hand on the strings to stop the resonating of the music. "Claire's gone," he said. Michael didn't sound overly concerned because this happened occasionally—Claire would be off before the rest of them woke up, out and helping Morganville before seven-thirty in the morning.

Shane called from the kitchen, "She left a note." Michael heard him press the brew button on the coffee maker. "She's with McFang."

"_Which_ McFang," Eve asked. "That family populates _half_ of Morganville."

"You know which one," Shane said, coming back out and smelling like coffee. "Myrnin." Shane had gotten better about Claire being with Myrnin lately; he didn't grumble out the name or grit his teeth while saying it anymore. It seemed he finally realized Claire was going to work with Myrnin for a long time—and it was something he'd have to put up with. Shane sat himself down on the couch.

Michael resumed playing his guitar. "Doesn't she have school?"

"Amelie gave her some slip that excuses her from missed classes since she makes Claire run around so much," Eve answered. She stretched out like a cat against Michael and said, "I feel like it's going to be a lazy Friday." She yawned. "I don't feel like going to work and serving a bunch of spazzy kids."

"Yeah," Shane said, agreeing. "And I want to wait for Claire to get home."

"I don't have anything to do today, so I'll hang with you guys," Michael said. "And—"

Just then, the phone rang. Shane was closest, so he leaned across the arm of the couch and picked it up. "Hullo?"

A moment passed before Shane's brows furrowed and he straightened in his seat. "Who's this?" He paused, waiting for an answer. "Hello?"

Michael listened in as Eve stared at them both, trying to get a reading from either of them. Soon Shane rolled his eyes and waited a second longer before taking the phone from his ear and hanging it back up on the receiver.

"What happened?" Eve asked.

"Prank call," Shane replied. "It was someone breathing weird on the other end."

"Sort of hitched," Michael added. "Like he had trouble taking in air and then forgot to let it out. It was uneven, but not like they were holding their breath. It was… strange."

"What are you thinking?"

Michael's lips stretched and became a thin line as he thought about it. His face relaxed after a second as he said, "It's probably nothing. I bet it was just a stupid kid."

The phone rang again. Michael tensed and his breathing stopped and Eve threw a nervous glance his way before watching Shane pick up the phone with unnecessary force.

"Look, whatever you're going to say, you can shove up your ass because I don't w—"

The voice on the other end spoke loudly enough so that it was clear to everyone in the room, even Eve.

"_If you want to see her alive again, you'll come to the little abandoned grocery store next to the warehouse in ten minutes_."

The line went dead.

Shane stared at Eve and Michael before he processed the information. He looked at the phone and saw the caller I.D.

"It's Claire."

Eve swore, Michael set down his guitar, and Shane jumped into action.

"Get dressed, grab a stake—let's go," he said, rushing upstairs.

Eve got up with a moan and said, "Really? Friday? Why couldn't it have been a Monday?"

Michael gave her a quick kiss on the top of her head. "Why Monday?"

"I already hate it enough; this would have given me reason to hate it more."

"Wow," Shane said, coming down the stairs and buttoning his pants. "Reasonable girlfriend, Mikey," his tone was coated with a sticky top layer of humor that was too forced to sound real. He threw a pair of jeans at Eve. "I took the liberty of going into your room and getting those for you. Your room, by the way," he added, "clean it." He turned away so Eve could change.

Michael, already dressed, grabbed the keys and opened the door, avoiding the patch of light that entered the house.

"I'll show you to tell me what to do," Eve mumbled, she zipped up the fly and buttoned her jeans and walked past Shane.

"Right, tell me on the way," Shane said, going out the door after Eve.

* * *

A few blocks north, Claire and Myrnin were sitting in the lab watching "_Revolutionary Road_" while Myrnin fawned over Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet's 'timeless beauty.' Claire had no idea her friends were in danger.

* * *

In the grocery store, a vampire sat on a metal folding chair with his legs crossed elegantly in the dark, waiting among aisles that held pieces of forgotten cardboard and Styrofoam. He had blond, wavy, shoulder-length hair that was unkempt and dirty. His red shirt stood out against shadows, enhancing the color of his lips that were turned up in a disconcerting smile. But the most unusual thing about him was a scar that was a perfect circle off-centered on his forehead.

This vampire had a different way about him than the other ones in Morganville did. He looked—triumphant. As if he was already victorious, despite not nearly having begun his game.

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	3. Together They Fall

Shane and Eve couldn't see through the windows of Michael's vampire car, and so they felt as if the road was flying underneath them without any real sense of direction; the feeling was foreign—as if they were a new kind of blind.

"Where are we, and how long until we get there?" Shane asked impatiently, trying to peer out the window but finding he was incapable of doing so.

"We're a block away," Michael said, staring ahead intently.

Eve was unusually quiet where she sat in the back. "I hope Claire's okay," she said softly, staring at the blacked-out window. The boys expressed their agreement by giving her a silent nod.

"Okay," Michael said, coming to a stop. "We're here."

Shane opened the door and squinted against the harshness of the sun.

"Guys," he added.

Shane paused and looked back at Michael.

"I don't know what's going to be in there, but…" Looking in the review mirror at Eve, he said, "I love you." Then to Shane, "You too, man."

"Same," replied Shane. "You're my best friend."

Eve rolled her eyes. "Really? We have to receive a death threat for Claire from a creepy guy who can't breathe right for you two to start saying how you feel? Give me a break and just chest bump like guys normally do."

A corner of Michael's lips tilted up, as did Shane's, but their faces smoothed out again quickly.

"Stay behind me," Michael said. "Let's go."

They got out of the car and Michael ran with vampire speed to the relative safety of shade under the awning of the shop.

It was a little mom and pop store that had gone out of business maybe twenty years ago. No one had bought the property because the warehouse degraded its existence and made customers hard to come by, plus it would cost more than it was worth to tear down. The windows were boarded up, but the front doors were left uncovered. Usually, there were chains wrapped around the door handles and a padlock securing the store's abandonment. But they were gone today, allowing Michael, Eve, and Shane easy access to the building. Shane opened the door; Michael went first, then Eve, and finally Shane who closed it behind them.

Soft light entered the aging building but it was dark for the most part. Shelves that once held canned goods, loaves of bread, and other things of the sort now only had pieces of cardboard and Styrofoam resting on top of them. Dust mites swirled in the air around the two young adults and their vampiric ally in the silence of the store, prodding them forward and eagerly awaiting the encounter that was yet to come between the expecting vampire and the trio.

With Michael in the lead, they walked to the back where empty boxes were strewn about the floor. But to the left, sitting on a folding chair, was the vampire in the red shirt. They got in a defensive stance, eyeing him doubtfully. _Was he it? _But they knew enough about vampires to know that just one of them could do some serious damage.

"You all have impeccable timing," he said, which surprised them. "It had been exactly five hundred forty-three seconds when I heard your vehicle pull up in the lot. And then precisely fifty-seven more to enter the building." He licked his lips in what seemed to be anticipation.

They studied him closely, making note of the odd scar on his forehead and the way his hands twitched involuntarily. One of his fingernails was torn down to the quick and there was dried blood around it. He had messy hair that looked as if he hadn't brushed it in a decade. His fangs were down and his legs were crossed—a mix of signals that contradicted themselves, making him hard to read. And then, there was something that was off about him no one could put a finger on. No one but Michael.

"You don't breathe," he said.

The vampire's face twitched before he smiled hostilely. "Well done, boy. I don't unless I need to, which is about six times every hour. It's a habit of mine, not breathing. I died in water—drowned. And this," he said, tapping his forehead. He was showing them the scar that was in a perfect circle over his left brow. "Shot in the head."

"That explains a lot," Shane mumbled. The hand that held his stake was steady.

"How amusing. There's a funny one in your group," he said in a flat tone, not sounding amused at all.

"Let's get to the point," Eve cut in. "What did you do with Claire, D-bag?"

"Oh, and here's one that bites." The stranger got up, and everyone tensed. He laughed. "Calm down. I'm not going to attack. Not yet, anyway. I just want to properly introduce myself." He, surprisingly, went over to them and held out his hand to Michael who eyed it distrustfully. "Oh, come on. It's propriety where I come from." Michael shook it tentatively and they looked into each other's eyes, light blue into near-black.

Shane saw a little rectangle in the strange vampire's pocket that must have been Claire's phone.

"Leo Price," he said, breaking off the firm handshake with Michael. He moved over to Shane and shook his politely, too. "I was born in eighteen thirty-five in America and died fighting in the Civil War. Then I got this little beauty—" he indicated his scar once more "—during World War Two." While Price's hand was in his, Shane noticed how his lips twitched involuntarily when he wasn't talking and the trouble he had with relaxing his face.

Price moved to Eve and smiled appreciatively. "Your name?" he asked.

She gave him a confused look and said, "Um, Eve."

His eyes roved over her body. "_Hello_, Eve."

"Hello, pervert," she said, taking a step behind Michael.

Suddenly, Michael was swinging a punch at Price, but he caught Michael's fist and held it tightly. "That, on the other hand, is not how we greeted each other in my time." He threw back Michael's hand and kicked him in the stomach, sending him flying back into an aisle of shelves.

Shane was on Price in a second, his silver stake up in the air above his heart. But Price knocked it out of his hand and threw Shane to the ground, Shane's head collided into the linoleum floor with an unsettling _crack_. He groaned, assuring Eve he was otherwise okay, but remained motionless.

Michael was up again and put himself in front of Eve. Price was on the offensive and Michael, defensive; every time he took a step forward, Michael took one back. Soon, Price had Michael and Eve backed into a corner.

"So, how are you and Claire related and why is there so much talk of her in this town?" he asked curiously.

Eve paused.

"You mean— Don't you know?"

"I know that she's important to Amelie." It was the first time Price had said the Founder's name and he said it with great disdain. "And if she's important to Amelie, I want her dead."

"Where's Claire," Eve demanded. Price didn't respond. "_Where is she?_"

"Well," he said, avoiding the question, "not dead."

Then he reached out and bashed Eve and Michael's heads together, the butt of his wrist hitting their temples. They fell to the floor, both unconscious.


	4. Relocating

Claire woke up in one of Myrnin's large armchairs facing the television he had put on the floor in the corner of his lab because he didn't have room for it anyplace else. She must have fallen asleep while watching "_Titanic_" for the second time. She groaned and rubbed her eyes. A movie marathon at Myrnin's was not her idea of fun.

"Oh, good," Myrnin said from where he stood hunched over, peering into a microscope, "you're up."

"What time is it?" she asked. The room was filled with a yellowish glow that came from a lamp in the corner; its brightness was poor, leaving the majority of the lab in shadow.

Myrnin shrugged. "Around nine o'clock." He straightened and shut off the illuminator on his aged device. "But we have things to take care of." The only light came from behind him so Claire couldn't see his face. Myrnin had put on a leather trench coat with black pants and was looking as if he was about to embark on a trip to the supermarket, but she didn't ask. Claire had learned not to ask about certain aspects of Myrnin after a while.

She sighed and stood, stretching out the stiffness in her muscles from sleeping in a chair. "Things to take care of?" she repeated. "Like what?"

"Cleaning."

She made a face as she looked around the messy lab. It wasn't as bad as it would be if she hadn't cleaned Wednesday, but Myrnin had _still_ found a way to break several flowerpots, scatter books around the place, and leave the lab tables piled with a great mass of tangled tubes, beakers, and bottles of liquids.

"Just because you receive a death threat doesn't mean that you're no longer my apprentice," he said, unconcerned. "And besides, we must relocate temporarily."

"Why?"

"Because our scent is all over Morganville, and it leads right to this place."

Claire let out another deep breath. "Fine."

She began cleaning and, for the first time in her long career with Myrnin, he offered to help tidy up—or, _nearly_ offered: "We need to get this done quickly," was all he said, and then disappeared from her sight as he zoomed around, picking up books and putting them on shelves, his trench coat flapping behind him.

"Okay. I'll just—straighten these up," Claire said, going over to the lab table and picking up vials and other miscellaneous instruments.

Claire had only tidied up half the table before Myrnin was done and handing her a pile of journals. "Here, take these. If our perpetrator comes to my lab and decides to look through my records, he won't be stealing my most valuable bits of information." She held out her hands and he dropped them all in her arms; she staggered under the weight.

She peered over the tops of the old leather-bound books and saw the lab was—nearly—spotless.

"Congratulations," Claire said sarcastically, "you just cleaned your own lab. Do you feel any different?"

"Bored," he said. "It's boring—but we have bigger fish to fry, Claire." He took half of the books off her stack and carried them in his own arm, making the load look almost weightless. Myrnin walked over to the green door that led to nowhere and opened it. "Frank," he said, his tone already impatient. There was no answer. "_Frank._"

"I'm coming," a voice snapped from the TV speakers and an old radio. Frank Collins' two-dimensional figure came into being before them. "_What_. Oh, hey," he said when he saw Claire. She gave him a thin-lipped smile as right now was not the time for proprieties.

"How many abandoned houses are there in Morganville?" asked Myrnin.

Frank thought for a second and then replied, "Five."

"Their locations?"

"All of them are on the other side of town in the not-so-pleasant part of Morganville. One of them is a Founder House—the rest, condominiums that were established twenty or so years ago."

Myrnin thought about it for a minute, looking almost ridiculous in his long leather coat. "We'll take the Founder House," he said. "Please open a portal for us, and then I would appreciate it if you closed off access to everyone besides Amelie. Only she may use them."

Claire felt a shift of something in the room and then saw the shimmery surface of a portal.

"That it?" Frank asked. "Can I go now?"

"There is one more thing," was Myrnin's spoken afterthought. "Have you recently let anyone into Morganville without letting me know?"

Frank rolled his eyes. "Just a kid who went to a hospital out of state, but Amelie knows about him, so…" He trailed off, but then got a suspicious look in his eye that he directed toward Myrnin. "Is there anything in _particular_ you wanted me to say, Fang Bang?"

"Of course not, Mr. Collins, but I would appreciate it if you didn't call me names. Besides, you've already used all the creative ones you had, and I don't especially like repetition."

"Then see you later." His tone softened when he looked at Claire. "Later, kid." His flickering frame disappeared, but the portal remained intact.

"After you, Claire," Myrnin said, his gesture toward the portal not as grand as it would have been had he not been holding a stack of journals.

Claire stepped through and, for a split second, thought she was going to drop all of Myrnin's records, but her feet met solid ground in the next moment. She looked around. The Founder Home they were in looked like the Glass House, but was in a state of decay that a layer of paint would only partially fix.

Claire heard what sounded like someone viciously issuing a string of foreign swear words from behind her in Myrnin's lab. She was about to look back, when suddenly something large was falling on her. The handwritten documents tumbled out of her arms. Myrnin fell on top of her and the books he had been holding went flying as well.

"Claire?"

Claire groaned. "What the actual f—"

There was a flash of power Claire attributed to the portal closing, but it was different—more forceful and less controlled. But it closed, nonetheless.

Myrnin was up in an instant and feeling the wall where the portal had been. In the Founder House, they were near a front door in a short hallway that opened up to the living room. A small table was situated in the little hall with a bowl that must have once held key rings and wristwatches.

Myrnin turned around and held out his hand to help her up. Claire took it and stood, brushing dust off the front of her clothes.

"Forgive me, Claire," he said. "Anyway, it would seem that our vampire was in my laboratory; he pushed me through. He tried to follow us, but I closed the portal."

Claire rubbed her ribcage in a place she thought might be bruised. "What's that?" she asked, eyeing a piece of something brown on the floor that looked as if it didn't belong in this house. Myrnin went over and picked it up and Claire saw that it had stained the carpet a dark red.

He analyzed the thing with fascination. Claire had an idea about what it was, but didn't want to believe it. Unfortunately, her fear was confirmed when Myrnin said, "It's part of his toe."

The brown around the top of the piece of flesh was part of a leather shoe; Myrnin peeled away the leather and revealed the top half of a big toe, the nail and the flesh all too real to Claire. She felt the urge to be sick and looked away, covering her mouth.

"That's disgusting," Claire said, her hand muffling her words.

"It's usually much worse, so be grateful that isn't his whole foot."

* * *

A mile away, Eve came to in a dark room, the only lighting was dim and came from a single window in the place that looked out into a hallway. Her left forearm stung and she looked down where she found two holes in her wrist an inch apart.

She swore.

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**Continue reading, chapter five is next; there's action and stuff.**


	5. A Soldier's Story

**Don't forget to tell me what you think by leaving a review. Specifically with these points in it: How am I doing so far? Is this fic worthy of your time? How do you feel about this Leo Price and what do you think about his character?**

* * *

Eve was on the floor in the corner right next to the door that was in the same wall as the window. She sat up, but her head became dizzy quickly. She leaned against the white wall and looked to her left; what she saw scared her into a scream.

Shane was lying a few feet away in the middle of the room, holes identical to the ones on her wrist were on his neck with dried blood around the mark. His breathing consisted of long and deep inhalations. There was a pool of blood around his head and Eve couldn't take the sight of him in such a horrific situation; never had she seen Shane like this—so weak and exposed.

In a corner, there were silver chains bolted into the wall with shackles on the end. Custom-made for vampires. They were empty, thank God, but where was Michael?

There was scuffling in the hallway and Eve hastily moved herself away from the door. In the window, she could see Price had Michael in a hold that secured him by his neck and he was struggling against him.

Price peered into the window and Eve had no time to feign unconsciousness—they made eye contact. He knew she was awake; she had made a huge mistake by moving away from the window. He gave her a smile that sent chills down her back.

She had never been so frightened in her life. She was disoriented, uninformed of what was going on, and Leo Price really, truly terrified her.

"_Shane_," Eve whispered, her voice trembling. "_Shane, wake up_." But Shane didn't stir.

In the next moment, the door was opening and Michael was thrown into the room, his back slamming into the far wall. He gathered Eve in his arms and kissed her quickly on the forehead. His shirt was stained with blood and he looked worn out.

"Don't give him any information," Michael said. "He doesn't have Claire and he doesn't know where she is."

"What's happening?" she said frantically, grasping the front of his shirt and pulling him close to her. "What did he do to you? What's wrong with Shane?"

"He just asked me questions," Michael said, his tone soft, trying to comfort Eve. "Shane woke up for a while, but then Price drank from him, but had to knock him unconscious first."

"Cooperate," Price snapped, giving Michael a stern look, "or they die." He jerked his head toward Eve and Shane. Price forced Eve to let go of Michael and pushed him into the corner with the chains and shackled his wrists together.

"I'm sorry," she said softly when Michael hissed in a breath as his skin began to sizzle in response to the silver.

"This isn't your fault," Michael said.

Price's eyes met Eve's again and she froze. She was unsuccessful in suppressing a shudder that ran down her spine. Eve felt her heart rate increase rapidly and her mouth went dry.

"_Don't_ hurt her," Michael spat at him. "Or you'll regret it."

Price laughed. "Will I?" He didn't wait for a response. He reached down and plucked Eve off the ground as if she weighed nothing and stood her up. His hand was wrapped around her wrists tightly as he dragged her out of the room. She was going to get bruises just from this, his grip on her was so tight.

"Stop, _please_," Eve begged as he pulled her down the hall. "Don't _do_ this. This isn't right."

"If only everyone in the world had a conscience like you did, Eve," Price said, leading her to the back of the little store. "The world would be such a better place."

She saw he was limping and had a blood-stained cloth bandage wrapped around his foot.

A door was at the end of the hall and Price pushed it open. It was a small warehouse full of empty, different-colored plastic crates, the floor was cement and it was cold. A single chair was set in the middle of the uninviting room and Eve couldn't look away from a puddle of blood a few feet away from it.

Price pushed her inside and closed the door behind him quickly, shutting it tight and securing it with a lock.

"So, Eve," he said, moving toward her, "how are you?"

She gave him the dirtiest look she could muster, becoming herself once more. "Are you _serious_? You kidnap my friends and me, snack on us and beat the crap out of Michael, and you're asking me how I'm _doing_? Are you out of your mind?"

Price shrugged. "Perhaps." He rubbed the circular scar over his left brow absently. He snapped out of his trance quickly and then pointed at the plastic chair. "Sit. I have a story to tell you and it's a bit lengthy; I suggest you be comfortable for the duration of it."

"I have a question first," Eve said, regaining her confidence. "Where's Claire?"

"Well, as your lover told you," Price articulated, "I don't know. I followed the scent of her and Amelie's scientist man to a little laboratory and found them going through a magical doorway that gave me this." He gestured to his foot sharply. Eve saw the bloody bandage around his foot and grimaced. "Now sit," he said, pointing to the chair once again.

She gave him a distrustful look but sat.

He began pacing in front of her idly as he rubbed his chin thoughtfully. "Where to start…" He halted and then looked at her again as if seeing her for the first time. He gave Eve a sly smile and eyed her wrist with the fang marks on it. "You taste lovely, dear." Fear crept back into her system, but she tried to ignore it. He hit himself on the head and shook. He scrubbed his face with his hands and seemed to recompose himself.

"Very well, I suppose if I should start anywhere, I should begin with when and how I died." He stopped his pacing, his arms folded behind his back and his gaze off somewhere in the distance. "It was during the Civil War and I was twenty-six, awfully young to die. I didn't die at the hands of men, but of a woman. A single god_damn_ woman and her name was Amelie." Eve's brows furrowed as she tried to make sense of this.

"One day, I was thrown off a train because I had gotten into a fight with a Yankee; the thing was full of them and they all conceded to toss me out. I landed in a godforsaken wasteland and trudged for miles and miles through dust and heat until I reached Morganville.

"A group of men had come to get me as soon as I had crossed the border of the town. They brought me to meet Amelie personally, which was apparently a big deal. She asked me what I was doing here and all I said was that I just wanted a glass of cold water. I asked her what she was because I got suspicious of the way she acted. The way she carried herself wasn't like anything I'd ever seen before. It just wasn't human and I told her so—I told her so outright, but she ignored me.

"We got to talking after that and I told her I was fighting for the Confederacy. She asked if I was proud to be fighting for the South and I said, Yes, ma'am, certainly I am. She had a telegraph machine in her office—right there in her office—and clicked away immediately after I said I was proud to be fighting for old Jefferson Davis. I heard some of it, '_Leo Price, Confederate soldier, knows about the town. Frontline of battle._' She was done in a minute. There was a response soon which she read and smiled at. And then got me water and let me go."

Price ran a hand through his tangled hair, brushing out some snarls but effectively making it even messier than it had been before. "She got me into the first battle of the ironclad ships because she said to me, '_Have fun at sea, Mister Price_.' I said I didn't know what she was talking about, but she did. She did because she got me stationed in _The_ _Monitor versus The Merrimack_.

"I was hit with a bullet from _The Monitor_ and fell off the top of _The Merrimack_ into the sea. I kept afloat for a while until I felt myself in shallower water, but that was where I drowned. I have a vague memory of someone lifting me out and running me somewhere—running me somewhere faster than anything. And he changed me. His name was Jenson, but after he turned me, I never saw him again. He only said to me, 'Keep to yourself. That's the only way you're going to survive.'"

"Sounds rough," Eve said, "but I don't think you need to be terrorizing Amelie because of it."

"_You don't understand!_" She jumped in her seat. Price glared at her. "_She_ made me what I am," he seethed.

Eve was a little shaken, but said, "Buddy, your thought process is a little screwed up. I mean, _Amelie_ didn't make you a vampire. Some other guy did."

Price's anger had barely been hidden throughout his story, but he lost control of it then.

"_She_ forced me onto _The Merrimack_ because I knew about her town! I _know_ my death was her intent! You stupid humans think that you can have a smart, disrespectful mouth—"

He kicked the chair Eve was sitting in across the room into a pile of crates. She barely had time to cry out before she was colliding with a mass of sharp plastic edges and corners. She felt them dig into her skin and some of them broke through. Blood trickled down her arms.

"Have you learned your lesson?" Price snarled, making his way over to Eve. "Have you realized that you humans are inferior to us?"

Eve, in that moment, realized she might die. And so, in a very Eve-like way, she said, "Your intellect astounds me. First you hate Amelie for making you a vampire, and then you talk about how you're superior to us—"

There was a banging on the door and both Eve and Price looked to see what was happening when it flew off its hinges and crashed into the far wall.

Michael and Shane stood in the doorway, a livid look on both of their weary faces.


	6. Amelie's Ultimatum

Shane was holding a large wrench as his brown hair hung in his eyes and sweat dripped down the side of his face. His complexion was an unhealthy gray, and from the bite mark on his neck trickled a thin flow of blood.

Michael looked better in comparison, but not even close to appearing in good health. He was pale and there was blood on his shirt. His wrists were a crispy black where the silver shackles had been wrapped around them; shiny pink skin around the edges was a sign of the injuries beginning to heal.

However, one thing about them was very alive: the fire in their eyes. Raging flames in light brown and bright blue threatened to escape the confinements of the boys' colorful irises and burn all of them faster than the sun would turn both vampires in the room to ash.

Price's confused face asked the question Eve was wondering as well: _How did you two get out?_

"You didn't lock the door," Shane said, answering the unsaid inquiry. He nonchalantly reinstated his grip on the wrench in his hand that was hanging at his side. He tapped it against his leg in a way that seemed to be idle but, seeing the murderous look on his face, anyone could tell it was a threatening gesture. "There was also a box of tools in another room you used to hang up the chains with. You forgot to return them to…" He looked at the metal tool in his hand and read off the handle: "The Conroy's… 1620 South Vesper Drive." He looked back up at Price. "Thievery in Morganville isn't all that tolerated."

Michael jerked his chin in Eve's direction. "And she's not yours."

Price snarled and his eyes turned to slits. "Soon, this whole town will be mine and I'll have _everything_. Everything _everyone_ in this town loves, I'll own."

Eve spoke up. "You are _sick_. Do you even have a _plan_?"

Price turned on her and started yelling again. "DO YOU _KNOW_—"

Michael was no longer standing in the doorway of the warehouse, but was running toward Price with vampire speed. Unfortunately, Price turned around and met Michael in the middle in the warehouse over the pool of blood, making the cement slippery.

"I'm partially insane, fledgling," Price laughed as they clashed. "Not deaf or uncoordinated. No one can sneak up on me like that."

Shane, seeing the two vampires were occupied, ran over to Eve and hugged her. "Are you okay?" he asked.

She couldn't find words to express how relieved she was that Shane and Michael were there, saving her; to see that he was okay, not unconscious and lying on the floor; and that, even in such a dark situation _clearly _in which none of them were okay, he had asked anyway.

She laughed softly through her tears and nodded her head shakily. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm okay. How did you get out of there?"

"I regained consciousness when Michael hit the wall, but I didn't open my eyes. I knew if I had said anything to let Price know I was awake, he'd do something about it like tie me up—so I didn't. I heard him take you back here; when I knew he had gone, I told Mikey I was up. I explored the place a bit and found a toolbox with pretty much everything we needed to get him out of those chains. And this," he said, holding up his wrench, "came in handy when we busted the door open. I just hit the hinges a couple of times and Mikey did the rest."

Up close, she noticed how bruised Shane was. His forehead had gotten the worst of it from when Price had initially smashed him into the linoleum floor. The corner of one eye was black and his bottom lip was split, not to mention the dried blood on his face and in his hair from resting in a puddle of his own plasma. His hand shook a little when he smoothed her hair back.

"We'll be okay," he said.

Unfortunately, Shane had made a promise he had no control over.

Price struck Michael hard in the back of the head and, to Eve and Shane's devastation, their friend was lying on the floor within a few minutes.

"_No!_" Eve cried.

Before Michael had been unconscious and on the ground long enough for Price to start doing damage to him while he was out, Shane jumped in with his wrench. He lasted awhile against him with it, but Price twisted it from his hand and threw it to the side and grabbed Shane around the throat. He tightened his grip.

"Eve," she heard Shane say in a whisper. "_Run_."

He became limp and Price threw him to the ground like a toy doll before he turned to Eve.

But Eve wouldn't run. Not with Michael and Shane here, lying on the ground like… nothing. Eve did her best, but she was no match for a vampire that was more than a century old. She really only could have hoped to prolong her imminent fate. Price easily reached around her neck and pressed a pressure point that put her to sleep instantly.

* * *

Leo Price triumphantly looked around the room at all of his victims lying on the cold floor. He sneered at them, the cocky humans and the naïve fledgling, the ones who thought they were better than him.

Price went over and picked up Michael, the child that believed he could talk Price out of holding them hostage in order to get to Amelie. Michael was an inexperienced and unrealistic vampire who was young both mentally and physically. Price threw Michael's limp body over his shoulder, walked out of the warehouse, down the hallway, and into the room he had initially used as their prison.

He found that the shackles he'd used to keep Michael restrained were in pieces; the tools he had used to hang up the restraints in the first place were a few feet away from the mess of silver. It wasn't a problem, though. Price had fought in World War Two where, to serve in the position he'd occupied, he had to take an engineering class. He didn't use any protection against the silver that ate away at his skin; he found the pain strung him to reality. It hurt, but over time he had found that if he lost himself in his sea of thoughts and uncaged emotions, he would drown within himself and be engulfed by mania. Facing a little silver was better than the alternative—himself.

The shackles were reassembled quickly and he attached Michael to the wall once again.

Price picked up the box of tools and went into another room across the hall where there were all kinds of weapons he had collected in Morganville over the past few days since his arrival. Rope had been difficult to find, so there was little of it, but he had some nonetheless. Price put the box of tools down and grabbed a circle of rope. He went back to the warehouse and picked up the boy and the girl—Eve.

Leo hadn't wanted to tie up the humans in the beginning; the flow of blood within their fragile bodies slowed and then the goods became rotten, almost old. But if they were going to try and escape once, he would make it more difficult for them the second time, even at the cost of the delectability of their blood.

Price brought them back to the room and tied them up separately, putting them on different sides of the place and away from the vampire. He frowned at his handiwork and looked at it closely, trying to think if it would be possible for them to escape. Price, for good measure, went back into the weapons room and grabbed a bucket of nails. He returned and stuck about ten nails into the knots he'd tied around both of their wrists and ankles; he twisted the nails around the gnarls in the rope that ensured their captivity so they would be unable to wiggle away.

He smiled, feeling the loose control he had over his mouth falter every now and again, causing his lips to twitch involuntarily. Price pursed them tightly and clenched his fists to feel as though he had the full ability to operate his body and bend it to his will as he pleased—though he knew that was sometimes not the case.

He hit himself on the head hard enough to cause him a moment's indisposition, but all for the purpose of not beginning an unconscious argument with his own body. Price shook his head at his own slight incapability and closed the door on the sleeping children, locking it behind him. He crossed the hall, back into the weapons room.

Price rubbed his chin in thought as his eyes roamed over the numerous ways he could take care of Oliver, because he—Amelie's second in command of Morganville—was Leo's next target.

* * *

"_Hi, this is Claire. Myrnin's unavailable at the moment, and I'm not too sure he'll call you back because he's not too skilled with—_"

"_I am _too_ skilled!_" was Myrnin's indignant cry in the background. There was a sigh from Claire and then the prerecorded message ended with a beep, signaling Amelie to leave audible content in Myrnin's virtual mailbox.

"Myrnin, this is Amelie. It would seem that you lied to me when you said that you would have your cellular device powered on and on your person. Perhaps you've lost it again, which is unfortunate because this is your _sixth_ phone in the past year. Anyway, I called not to lecture you on the importance of these electronic devices, but to inform you I have some information regarding the vampire who sent Claire the little note. His name is unknown, but Oliver has seen him around Common Grounds."

Amelie closed her phone and sighed. She placed it on her desk and picked up a fountain pen to resume going over paperwork, but it rang again in the next moment.

It was Myrnin.

She picked the phone up and brought it to her ear once again.

"Myrnin, I—"

"Amelie!" a cheery voice that was most certainly _not_ Myrnin's said loudly. "It's Leo. Confederate soldier Leo Price. I'm calling to inform you I have several of your people with me who, admittedly, did not come here volitionally. The number is going to increase soon. But, I'm willing to trade them all for you. Think about my offer—the lives you'll save. I'll call back as soon as I have another one of yours. Have a nice day, ma'am."

The line went dead and Amelie sat at her desk at a loss for words. The security her town possessed no longer felt relevant. Leo Price, an outsider whose existence she had just now been made aware of, had found a way into Morganville, taken Myrnin's phone—possibly even Myrnin himself—, captured several of her people, and had given her an ultimatum. Perhaps he was bluffing…

But perhaps he wasn't.

* * *

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	7. Missing

Myrnin was sitting at a kitchen table observing the flesh that had been removed from the vampire as he was trying to follow Claire and Myrnin into their 'safe haven' with a fork he'd found in the kitchen. It was lying on the table and he was poking it; he was beginning to lose interest in the thing.

Myrnin sighed. "You know, I wish he _had_ lost a foot or a leg; then I'd have more to work with than a _piece_ of a toe." Myrnin dropped the fork onto the table and sat back in his chair. He scrubbed his face and then looked over to Claire.

She was sitting on the relatively clean couch in the living room and raised her eyebrows at him questioningly. "Done yet?"

"I suppose," he said unhappily. "But I wish I had brought more than just a stack of my records. Perhaps a microscope or... or a few chemicals to test this with," he said, gesturing to the toe.

"You could... I don't know, read through the journals," Claire suggested. "I mean, what else is there to do?"

Myrnin gave her a plain look. "I've been over that garbage a thousand times—and that's _not_ an exaggeration."

"Garbage?" Claire repeated. "I thought you said that they were your more brilliant discoveries."

"They are," he said simply, turning back toward the piece of flesh and poking at it idly. "But it isn't as if I brought them to serve the purpose of my reading material. If you recall, I took them so that the vampire who wants you dead—or whatever—didn't have them to himself." He looked up to the cobwebby ceiling and gave an exasperated sigh. "_I'm bored._"

There was a moment of silence before Claire said, "Maybe we should just go back..." She desperately wanted to be at the Glass House and not in this dusty replica of it.

Myrnin seemed to contemplate her idea for an instant before he said, "Amelie said to stay out of harm's way, and I believe that's what we should do. Besides, I also want to see how these events unfold without our intervention. This vampire said he would burn us. Well, I'm curious to see if he's a man true to his word." He smiled widely and said delightedly, "Oh, I just love a good drama."

"Myrnin, you can't risk the lives of—"

"Don't waste my time with a lecture, Claire," he said, waving away her concern with his hand. "I hate an uninformative lecture."

"Right," Claire said, "you hate lectures on morality. I guess I sort of already knew that."

A minute passed. Claire looked around and then down at what she was wearing. Old, faded jeans with a whole in the knee, and a T-shirt she had gotten out of the pile of clothes in her room she'd meant to wash yesterday. She suddenly blushed, wondering if Myrnin could smell the difference between clean and dirty laundry.

"Can't we just—"

"Oh, _all_ _right_," Myrnin said dramatically. His pretense at being annoyed was impossibly awful. "I suppose if we _must_." He stood up and straightened his leather trench coat. "_Frank_."

"I was going to suggest if we could go to the Glass House so I could—"

"Oh, Claire," he said, dropping the woe-is-me-I'm-easily-annoyed-because-I'm-Myrnin-and-I'm-a-genius act. "I'm so bored. So _devastatingly_ bored. I must have something to do and if pushing Frank around is this something, then so be it."

Suddenly, Frank was standing (or whatever it was he did) before them, his eyes flashing menacingly at Myrnin. "I _heard_ that, you damned zombie."

"I am not a _zombie_, Mister Collins, and I resent you for even thinking it." He crossed his arms. "I won't stand for being compared to an undead earth-walker who only exists to feed on humans."

Without a doubt, Myrnin had just made the largest and most ironic contradiction probably in his whole existence. Claire wasn't going to say anything, especially when her boss was being so childish. But Frank, who had no regard for Myrnin's feelings, was.

"Vampires _are_ undead earth-walkers who only exist to feed on humans," Frank said, the condescension in his voice insurmountable to anything Claire had heard before. "I thought you were supposed to be a genius."

"I _am_ a genius—your mere existence proves it!"

"Right," Frank said. "Like my being alive is supposed to help your case. If you were any smarter, you'd have chosen someone else for this stupid job," he said, motioning to his black and white, two-dimensional figure.

"Calm down, guys," Claire said, trying to help. "It's not going to do us any good if we argue."

"Yes it will," Myrnin snapped. "My ability to think is higher after I've bickered with him; he makes me realize how smart I am because of the low level of intelligence he possesses."

"Frank," Claire said, interrupting their spat, "we need you to reopen the portals for us, is that okay?"

"Sure," Frank replied, ignoring Myrnin entirely and turning to her. "Anywhere in particular you're going?"

"The Glass House, please. Oh," Claire added, "and if anyone else calls you besides Myrnin or me, don't answer."

"No one?"

"No one," she confirmed. "I have the feeling that this guy isn't from Morganville and since you didn't know about him entering the town, he knows a bit more about you than you do about him."

Frank seemed to consider this for a moment before saying, "Got it. So, you want to go to the Glass House?"

"Yeah."

"Glass House it is."

Frank disappeared and then there was a portal where he had been standing. Claire picked up some journals and went through while hearing Myrnin say to Frank (though his form was no longer visible), "You could be that nice to _me_ sometime, you know."

* * *

Back in Myrnin's lab, a lamp was lit and threw enough light around the place to show an ill-seeing human the devastation that it had recently come across. Books were tossed to the ground, instruments had been smashed, and the contents of drawers were scattered across the floor while the drawers themselves rested in pieces a few feet away from their belongings.

Amelie took in the scene before her, feeling out of place and almost lost. Though she had helped Myrnin build this laboratory years ago, she was not in her element—Amelie was meant to be among thrones and crowns, not chemicals and dankness. She inhaled deeply to collect her thoughts and smelled dust, chemicals, and the underlying tang of silver lacing the air with its potency like a sharp spice such as garlic.

The Founder's eyes narrowed when she saw a trail of blood drops that led from the middle of the laboratory to the exit of Myrnin's lair that let out to the alley. There was no sign of a struggle. Amelie closed her eyes and used her matured sense of touch to reach out into the space around her and feel what had happened.

Particles of power and energy lingering in the old air touched Amelie's mind and whispered their stories into her ear.

Her eyes opened.

There been a portal and it was her scientist who had opened it; Myrnin had a signature way of opening them that always left a tangible flare of vigor behind. But that did not explain the blood—

_Or did it?_

Perhaps Price had opened a portal... but could not control it long enough to go through and consequently lost a small piece of himself?

No, no. It was impossible an outsider such as Price could have done such a thing. And, more importantly, it was definitely Myrnin who had opened it.

But that still did not answer the more pressing question: _Where were Myrnin and Claire?_

* * *

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	8. Untested

Amelie remembered Leo Price, but she hadn't realized how spiteful he could be—perhaps his person had become hardened over time. However, it mattered not because she was not responsible for discovering why he had such a vengeful spirit, just to stop said spirit in its disastrous tracks before it could do any more harm to her town.

The Founder was jerked out of her thoughts as a small, almost microscopic, fleck of silver landed on her hand and burned through the first layer of skin before she could brush it off. She then realized that the scent of the alloy was fresh if specks of it was still floating around in the air. When she inhaled again to test her theory, she found that it was newer even than the trail of blood that went up the staircase to the door leading outside.

Amelie followed the tangy smell to the back rooms and into Myrnin's makeshift weapons room in which he stored all of his inventions meant to maim or kill vindictive individuals. He was remarkably good at creating newer ways to kill others, a skill she would never give him direct praise for.

Unfortunately, when Amelie came to the doorway of the place where all weaponry was supposed to be, the room was empty and silver flecks hung in the air like dust in an attic.

There was, however, a note in the middle of the room, the sloppy handwriting matching that which had been on the note in the street tar this early morning. Amelie's sharp eyes homed in on the scrap of paper and vexedly read the word:

_Thanks_

* * *

In Common Grounds, Oliver walked into his office from his shift at the cash register. He sat down at his desk and began signing papers, approving order forms and authenticating checks tiredly. He hadn't fed in about three days and it made him slow and unresponsive. Oliver realized that this wasn't a good thing; he needed some blood, but Common Grounds had run out of its supply at the moment and he needed to get these papers signed.

Out of the corner of his eye, Oliver saw the phone on his desk flashing red, indicating he had a message. He sighed, picked it up off the receiver, set it on the table, and pressed a button to listen to the voicemail on speaker.

"I hope you know your American history, Oliver, because I am about to tell you a story regarding the Civil War. I know who the culprit is and it requires details involving the eighteen hundreds."

Amelie was speaking, and she was direct and to the point. Oliver knew what she was referring to because the last conversation they'd had was regarding the vampire who had left her the message in Mason Street earlier today.

"If I recall correctly," she continued, her voice made somewhat fuzzy because of the speakers on the phone, "he came to Morganville in search of something that would serve as a temporary haven. He almost immediately recognized what I was—what _we_ are—and forced my hand; I contacted a Union corporal who was helping organize the first battle of the ironclad ships. The corporal in question was an acquaintance of mine as well as an ally—a vampire. I requested that he leak false information to convince the Confederacy to have Mister Price serve in battle; only a few people were chosen to fight against _The Monitor_ and with the Confederacy believing that he was an important piece in the game, they were certain to choose him over other soldiers."

Oliver listened closely, following Amelie's story carefully. It was difficult to wrap his mind around; her strategy enveloped a wide network of people.

"The corporal said it was easily done, particularly because of his strong ability in the area of compulsion—a reason why he had been made a corporal in the first place. Regardless, he had a powerful influence over a large group of people, even the Confederacy.

"I sent Mister Price away and out of Morganville, but that was while Myrnin's machine was not as fully developed as it is now. Consequently, Mister Price has most likely retained the memories of entering Morganville and of myself contacting Corporal James about him, hence why he has harsh feelings toward the town.

"I do not usually leave messages this long, and I apologize for any inconveniences it gives you, but you needed to know immediately in the case you see him again in your shop. Good day." She hung up.

Oliver went through the information he had been given. He was leaning forward in his chair with his elbows on the desk and his head in his hand, massaging the side of his forehead.

"That's a very interesting tale."

Someone in a red billowy shirt with black pants and unbelievably messy dirty blond hair entered Oliver's office. He leaned against the doorway and Oliver recognized him as the vampire who had been in Common Grounds asking questions about the inner workings of Morganville: its most important residents, its strongholds, and its fighters.

The infamous Leo Price.

"But," Price continued, in a tone that could almost be interpreted as bored, "none of you know how the story ends." He trailed a finger along the wall as he made his way to Oliver's desk.

Morganville's second in command remained seated in order to establish dominance over Price. He also needed to remain looking as if he were indifferent so as to discover information that could be crucial to protecting Amelie. The red-shirted vampire went on, taking Oliver's silence as a passive gesture.

"Though, before I begin, I must insist you situate yourself so I'm more comfortable—or… By saying that, I suppose I mean _I _must situate you so that I am more comfortable with our ungracious position. In other words, you'll need to be paralyzed. Which is why I brought _this_." Leo Price pulled something out of his pocket. It was a black box with a antennae on the end and a red button in the center of the black thing.

"I admit, the scientist that works for Amelie is quite a genius," he said. Oliver began getting weary about himself remaining seated, but, really, how much harm could this lunatic cause him? "Although, he needs to work on the security around his home—and I'm speaking of the 'security' he created around Morganville _and_ his… _lair_."

"And how _did_ you make it into Morganville?" Oliver asked, attempting to sound neutral and uncaring. "Being Amelie's second, as you know, I would have heard if there was a new citizen in our town. I received no such news, and yet here you are before me." He pretended impressment.

Price waved his hand absently. "Oh, it was simple, really. I found some cords running around the border of your residence. I wrapped myself in the metal shell of a car I had found in the desert surrounding your humble abode and rolled myself across the border. Your joke of a machine would assess me as nothing more than a tumbleweed passing through, much less a vampire with ill will toward your Founder."

He flashed the boxlike device at Oliver and raised a playful eyebrow. "Do you know what this is?"

Oliver internally rolled his eyes, but was at a loss. He said tiredly, "No, I cannot say that I do. Are you going to explain, or am I going to have to take charge of this situation, because you are taking far too long to get to the point and I dislike digression."

Price let out a soft laugh that both in the room knew didn't indicate his amusement. "I'm going to take you to my temporary habitation. Though, of course, I don't expect you to cooperate, which is why I brought this." He held up the black rectangular device again. "Myrnin, your little scientist, has a whole room devoted to weaponry he invents, did you know? Now, one must take into account that these were designed by _him_ and serve no other purpose but to kill or stun vampires. I warn you, I found this under a tag labeled 'Untested.'" Price gave the thing a thoughtful look. "I'll tell him if it works or not."

Oliver let out a mocking laugh. "Hardly any toys of his work, especially if they've gone untested." He rose from his chair at his desk and prepared for the fight that was drawing nearer between the two vampires. His tone grew dark and menacing. "Will you fight me, or won't you?"

Price ignored him. "You know, it's a shame I have to go through with this; I've heard how twisted you can be. But you're one of the columns that supports Amelie and therefore you must be exterminated." He pointed the antennae of Myrnin's weapon at Oliver and put his finger on the button. "Don't worry, I don't think it hurts that much."

* * *

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	9. Closer

"_GOD IN HEAVEN!_"

Eve, Michael, and Shane woke up all around the same time with the same splitting headache and the scream that woke them did nothing to help their situation. It was Price who had shouted; he sounded furious and in pain.

The soft light spilling in from the hall through the window helped Eve to see as she inched her way across the tiled floor to sit next to Michael who was wincing at the hurt the silver shackles were causing him.

Michael was the first to speak. "What was that?" was his sensible question referring to the yell that had roused them.

"I don't know," Shane said from the other side of the room. He twisted around so he was lying on his side, facing Michael. "But I hope whatever it was got him good."

In the next minute, there was a great clanking of chains and the door to their room was being unlocked. It was tossed open and the next thing the trio knew, a ragged man was thrown into their little prison. The man turned his face toward entrance and spat at the disappearing form of Price. The door closed and everyone heard the lock click into place.

The light from the hallway fell onto the figure of Price's latest prisoner.

Eve's eyes widened. "_Oliver?_" she gasped.

Oliver's hair was out of its basic tie at the back of his head and he was wearing his usual hippie cover-up costume. He looked as if he had been on the receiving end of a few punches. The most concerning thing—besides the fact that he was with them in this confinement—was that Eve could tell distinctly where Price had roughed him up; bruises were forming around his face: his chin, his left cheek, and just next to his right eye.

The Elder vampire sat up, looking as if the movement took great effort. He was wrapped in silver chains and the skin the deadly metal touched sizzled unnervingly.

"Wh—" she began.

"Please, do not open your mouth if you have nothing crucial to say," he said, interrupting her tiredly. He sat up and moved toward the other wall to lean his back against it.

"What happened to _you_?" Shane asked, blatantly ignoring Oliver's request they keep quiet. He sat up as well. "You're bruised up."

"Yes, well," Oliver sighed, "that happens when one forgets to feed after awhile and then gets battered by a madman."

"You haven't—haven't fed?" Eve asked, eyeing Oliver wearily. "As in… _drank blood_?"

"_Obviously_," he snapped. "Keep away from me; your scent is becoming more appealing by the minute. In a few more hours, I'm going to be unable to find your blood resistible." Oliver said it factually, but it did nothing to stop the sudden rush of fear Eve felt.

She shot nervous glances at both Shane and Michael. A hungry vampire was in a room with two humans, hot blood pulsing through their veins…

This wasn't going to end well.

* * *

Price paced about in the weapons room, his lopped toe throbbing endlessly; Oliver had slammed his foot onto Price's wound, taking advantage of the weak spot. The injury was also refusing to heal properly. He didn't know why, but ever since the gunshot wound to his head, he had never been able to heal as quickly as he knew other vampires could. It was an unfortunate disability, but Price could cope.

But he was nearly there—nearly to his goal. Price needed to see Morganville's Founder alone and desperate, just as he had been, floating near the shore with blood seeping into the salt water around him. She deserved the same punishment he had received from her.

The same—just that the Founder would die.

He was going to remove the important players first, and he already had a few of them in his clutches: the Glass House residents, who, according to the vampires of Morganville, had stopped many conflicts within the town; and now Oliver, Amelie's second, a critical piece to have. All Price required were the mad scientist and the Danvers girl, both of which had escaped his seizure by using some form of magical transportation. But he would have them.

Surely, he would have them.

* * *

Claire and Myrnin were in the Glass House and Claire was slightly troubled by the silence that rang throughout her home. Maybe it was the fact that she had so recently been threatened that gave her a bad sense of foreboding. Nevertheless, the house was empty and it hardly ever was.

Suddenly, she remembered her phone. She checked her pockets and came up with nothing, though she knew it wasn't with her because it hadn't been since last night.

"Myrnin," she said, recalling the suspicious way he'd acted when Amelie asked him about _his_ phone, "do you have my cellphone?"

He glanced around shiftily. "No." Claire eyed him mistrustfully for a moment before Myrnin clapped his hands together abruptly, breaking the tension momentarily.. "Ah! I've read about these devices. Video games, are they not?" he asked, picking up a controller off the coffee table.

Claire put her hands on her hips. "Myrnin…"

"Oh, fine," he said, giving up. "he was following us, as you know." She nodded. "Well, I thought that by giving him my cellular device, I would make some things more... _exciting_."

"And what about mine?" she asked, tapping her foot on the floor. "Did you steal it from me?"

"_He—_our vampire friend_—_rushed up to you and plucked it out of your pocket. I figured I should move you out of the way before any damage could come about, and so I lifted you up and to my other side, using the excuse that you were going to trip over a crack in the sidewalk—which," he added, "you probably would have. And of course if he had _my_ phone that would make _some_ things more interesting. But if he had _your_ phone, my goodness, just imagine what else could happen!" he said, a shine in his eye.

"I _am_ imagining it," Claire snapped. "And I'm not liking it!"

The landline rang that very moment. No one moved to pick it up; Claire remained glaring at Myrnin as he looked anywhere but her face. It rang five times and then the answering machine kicked on.

Eve's cheery voice greeted the caller with:

"_Glass House residents, here. There's Michael, current rock star and boyfriend. There's Shane—occupation: smartass. And then me, Eve, girlfriend to Michael and ass-kicker. And Claire, the brains in this bunch._ _Leave a message after the beep_."

Claire hadn't realized that Eve had changed the greeting. She internally rolled her eyes.

"Claire," came the cool voice of the Founder, "if you receive this message, respond immediately. You, Myrnin, and your friends, as well as Oliver, have officially been reported as missing as there is a crisis erupting amidst us and you all are nowhere to be found. The vampire—Leo Price—who sent you the threat is at fault."

Claire went to grab the phone off the receiver, but Amelie hung up swiftly. She turned back to Myrnin with a glare.

Claire was _so_ done with his stupid games. "Myrnin," she said through gritted teeth, "where are my _friends_?"

He, looking serious for once, responded, "I… don't know."

"Well, you can find them, can't you? You can trace the vampire's scent who left me that threat?" He didn't respond. "Myrnin!"

"No," he said firmly without looking at her. "I told you we weren't getting involved, didn't I? I remain firm in this decision."

"Yeah, well you screwed that one up when you threw both of our phones at him so he could use them against us! This might have been prevented if I'd had my _phone!_"

"Ah, but you don't know that," he said, and Claire could tell he was grasping at straws now.

"My _God_, Myrnin," she said, anger lacing her words and wounding him like silver, "can't you—_for once_—just do the _right thing_ without having some kind of _stupid_ ulterior motive? I've done _everything_to get you to where you are now—disease-less and halfway sane—and you return the favor by _lying_ to me about something that could kill us _all_. What kind of person _are_ you?" Myrnin remained silent, which frustrated Claire further. She pointed violently at the front door. "Get. Out."

Myrnin just bowed his head and said somberly, "If that is what you desire, dear Claire, then so be it. But I really do not think that you should be out without proper protection from th—"

"The only 'protection' I need is from _you_," she said spitefully. "_Out._"

Myrnin nodded once, respecting her decision, and walked out the front door without another word, adjusting his leather jacket to keep the sun from doing its worst, not bothering to take his journals with him.

Claire sank into the couch and put her face in her hands.

_I was too mean_, she thought after a moment. _But I wasn't being unreasonable…_

Out of the corner of her eye, the phone caught her attention and she saw the blinking number _1_ on the answering machine that made her remember Amelie wanted her to call back.

Claire picked up the phone and dialed Amelie's number; she answered on the first ring.

"Claire?"

"Yes, ma'am, I'm here."

"We have urgent affairs that require immediate discussion," she said, her tone firm and voice strong.

"I'm listening."

"His name is Leo Price…"

* * *

**So... please review.**


	10. Claire

Claire got off the phone with Amelie after thirty minutes where she'd learned about Price, his motives, his story, and his (or at least what _sounded_ like) mild insanity. No one sane would blame_Amelie_ for him becoming a vampire and then take that hate to such a level. True, she had sent him to war with her intent being Price's death, but it had been some other insignificant person who had turned him.

Amelie could neither affirm nor deny that Price had Claire's friends, but after calls in to Shane's work, the university coffee shop, and the music store Michael gave music lessons at, Claire could. No one knew where they were; none of them had shown up for work, or any of their usual hotspots.

Her friends were gone.

And the unfamiliar feel of the Glass House's landline pressed to her ear reminded her all too clearly that it had been _Myrnin_ who was to blame for the disappearance of Michael, Eve, and Shane because he thought it would be _fun_ to give her phone to Leo Price. He got away with a lot of crap, but this time, Claire wasn't going to be so forgiving.

Amelie had told her to stay at the Glass House with Myrnin. It had been what Amelie wanted to keep Claire out of the way. Myrnin, however, was gone and Claire wasn't just going to sit around. She felt the need to be doing _something_ instead of sitting on the sofa, nervously awaiting her friends' arrival.

Somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew the only reason Amelie cared for her friends' disappearance was because Oliver was missing as well, and perhaps if Michael, Eve, and Shane were found, Oliver couldn't be far. Claire expelled the thought from her head as she began gathering equipment.

With or without help, she was going to go looking for Price.

.

She had everything she needed in five minutes slung over her shoulder in her backpack; instead of books, it contained stakes, a flashlight, and one of Michael's sports bottles filled with blood as possible bait for Price. Claire left Myrnin's journals on the table, stacked in a neat pile. She'd throw them through a portal later, when the threat of Price was no longer relevant. _And_ when she could properly give Myrnin a piece of her mind (metaphorically speaking, since Myrnin actually _did_ want her brain).

Claire walked out the front door and looked behind her, into the empty, darkened house that she almost didn't recognize because of the lack of activity within. She closed the door, locked it, and headed to the intersection of Mason and Howe where she had been early this morning, where Price had left her his message.

She was walking, trying not to remember as she passed the giant crack in the sidewalk that _this_ was where Myrnin had let that vampire steal her phone and create the mess they were in.

Claire continued walking and saw children had drawn on the cement with chalk. She did her best not to step on them; whatever innocence was left in Morganville should remain untainted.

Soon, Claire was at the corner of Mason and Howe and looking at the spot in the street where the letters had been carved. Fresh tar was over it now, smooth and dark—the only sign that Price had even been here.

Claire stood there for a moment, staring at the improvement to the road, biting her lip.

She sighed. "I don't know what I thought I'd get from this," she said to herself quietly, hitching her backpack higher up on her shoulder.

Claire turned around, but froze when she heard a rustle in the bushes; Price had been hiding in the shrubbery last night when he'd followed them here. What should stop him from hiding in them now?

She pulled a stake out of the pocket of her backpack and said firmly, "I know you're there."

No one answered.

"_Coward_."

Still nothing. Maybe she had imagined it.

A piece of red chalk on the sidewalk came rolling down the slight incline of the cement and came to rest at her feet. Claire glared once more at the clump of bushes, and then turned her attention to the chalk. She picked it up and moved it around in her fingers. It was large so a small child could easily hold it and draw pictures. She pocketed her stake and walked over to where she saw the pictures on the sidewalk, guessing that was where it had come from.

When Claire reached the section of sidewalk that the drawings were on she saw just exactly what they were of, causing her to drop the piece of chalk that broke in two when it made contact with the cement.

She stared.

This was anything _but_ art by an innocent child. This—this was _evil._

It was a picture with someone who she assumed to be her. She was in a cage while others (Eve, Michael, and Shane… and—_was that Oliver?_) were in a larger cage across from her. Myrnin had a stake through his heart and was lying on the floor, presumably dead. Amelie…

Amelie was hanging from the ceiling, a noose around her neck and a stake sticking out of the center of her chest as well.

A horrible mockery of a child's drawing.

Claire looked around her, searching to see if anyone was watching. There was no one. She began trying to smear the horrible thing with the sole of her shoe, but all that did was slightly smudge it. Claire looked around again anxiously.

And then there was a cackle of laughter—the same kind of laugh she had heard that morning, filled with madness. It was something that scared her more than anything else because it was almost_familiar_; because Myrnin used to laugh like that, too; and because it sounded close. So _incredibly_ close.

_Oh my God_, she thought. Even the voice in her head was shaking. _He's watching me_.

* * *

Oliver had suggested that he and Michael separate themselves from the humans; the sound of their blood pulsing through their veins was becoming all too tantalizing to him. So they, the two vampires, were on the other side the room while Eve and Shane were pressed as far against the wall as they could possibly be without leaving indentations in the plaster.

It wouldn't be long now; one of them—he or Michael—was going to cave and give in to their bloodlust.

But Oliver didn't want to come across as weak by being the one to lose his control first, though he had done himself a disservice by not feeding in such a long time. And he was practically _salivating_over the sound of their beating hearts.

The steady _thrum-thrum, thrum-thrum, thrum-thrum_ was driving him crazy.

This had been Price's sadistic plan: put weakened vampires in a locked room with humans.

_Thrum-thrum, thrum-thrum, thrum-thrum…_

* * *

It worried Myrnin that Claire was out on her own, but there was nothing he could do about it now. He would only wait for his opportunity to strike and take out the stranger in one smooth blow that would require minimal effort on Myrnin's part. If Claire did not wish to see him, he would help her from the sidelines and hope she did not get herself killed.

Myrnin had wasted no time when he'd been thrown out of Claire's house; Myrnin had rushed away to begin setting up an improvised holding cell for this newcomer. He was below his laboratory in one of the many caves that conveniently littered the underground of Morganville, putting the final touches on the… _interesting_ result of his improvisation.

So far, he'd bolted a silver chain with a collar at its end to the ground. Myrnin had also put a comfortable armchair just five feet away from the chain's radius; he would need to be comfortable while he interrogated this unusual vampire.

Perhaps he should make some tea.

* * *

"_No!_"

The shout was accompanied by a high-pitched scream and muffled sounds of fabric rustling followed with masculine grunts.

"Let _go_ of me, you creep!" That voice was undeniably Claire's.

Eve, Michael, and Shane scrambled up to look through the window and saw Price with Claire in his arms, carrying her like an infant, his grip on her unrelenting. She was thrashing and kicking and scratching at him, doing whatever she could to get out of his clutches, but Price's hold was firm.

"Claire!" Eve yelled. "_Claire!_"

She couldn't be here. If Claire was with Price… their chances of escaping before one of the vampires went crazy were very slim. Slimmer than they had been before.

"Claire," Shane said loudly, pounding on the glass. "Claire, get out of here!"

"Oh my God…" Michael kept muttering to himself quietly; Claire was never the one captured.

* * *

Claire heard them through the glass and her protestations ceased momentarily as she saw her friends all in the room together, bloodied and bruised. Her face twisted into a mask of regret and distress at seeing them that way, but was quickly replaced by confusion and then shock.

Eve had been standing there one moment, her hands pressed to the glass, and then she was being pulled down against her will, disappearing from Claire's view as if some invisible demon had dragged her from view.

Shane tore his gaze away from Claire and just as Price carried her into a warehouse and the door shut behind them, she heard Shane scream, "_Oliver, you dirty bastard!_"

* * *

**And so, shit finally hits the fan. As always, please leave a review on your way out and have a lovely day.**


	11. Caught

Price took Claire and roughly forced her onto a metal folding chair, taking zip ties and effectively cuffing her hands and feet to the arms and legs of the metallic seat. She was tightly bound to the chair, looking at the door that was her only way of escape. Claire's eyes returned to the vampire in the room, who was watching her closely.

"Please," she begged breathlessly. "Just let me make sure they're okay."

Price's eyes swept up and down her body with a clinical interest before he said, "There's no need to fear, Claire Danvers. Whatever is happening to them now is both unimportant and irrelevant to the discussion about to take place between us. But once we finish here, I will allow you to see them. _If_, of course, you cooperate with me."

This quieted her and Claire glared at Price. "What do you want," she said through her teeth. She was willing to cooperate, but it depended on what this man wanted.

While she was glaring, Claire couldn't help but notice the way his sadistic smile quavered, or the way that the hands at his sides trembled ever so slightly. These were signs of his insanity; Claire knew them well. While Myrnin and Price were not the same and had a different kind of madness, she could tell he wasn't all the way there and the control he had now wasn't going to last. The feeling of pity crept into her mind before he started speaking again.

"I want you to bring about the end of Amelie and her ridiculous reign."

All pity was definitely gone.

"Are you crazy?" she shot back, squirming in her restraints. "How would I even _do_ that?"

From beyond the door, Claire heard Eve shriek and then there was silence. Claire struggled against her bonds. "_Please_, just let me out."

"I am sure you have been informed of my... _past_, yes?" he asked as he stroked his chin in thought, ignoring the brief interruption and her plea entirely. Claire didn't even answer before he said, "Good. I hate telling that story. Now you only need aware of the strife that I have lived through all because of that terrible woman—your beloved _Founder_." To emphasize his point, his fangs slid out and his grin became menacing.

"I—" she began, but then remembered that if she played along, she would see Michael, Eve, and Shane. "I can help you get revenge, but I can't do it all on my own."

Price's smile became genuine and his fangs slid back into place. "Of course not, my child," he said, coming toward her and stroking a hand down her cheek. Claire cringed. "That is why—"

Suddenly, almost too quickly for Claire to see, a portal was opened and an arm clothed in the sleeve Myrnin's frock coat snaked out and grabbed Price by the throat, yanking him back through the doorway. Price hissed in surprise and she heard Myrnin bark a laugh before the portal closed.

For a moment it was silent.

"Myrnin!" Claire yelled, still crudely tied to the chair. There was no answer. "_Myrnin_!" Still nothing.

"_No!_" one of the boys roared; whether it was Michael or Shane, Claire didn't know. What she did know, though, was that he was furious. Claire could hear glass breaking and then in another second, the door to the warehouse was flying backwards and a man was standing in the doorway, panting heavily.

Oliver.

His hair was disheveled and his mouth was dripping blood. His eyes were red and staring right through her as he began to make his way toward her. Claire tried desperately to break free from her restraints, but that only resulted in pain. Oliver reached her and Claire instantly froze.

"Get away from her."

Michael was standing in—well, being supported by—the doorway. He looked much worse than Oliver and there were bruises blossoming in various realms of his face.

"Claire," he said, without taking his eyes from Oliver. "His desperation for blood gave him an energy burst—it won't last long, but he's too powerful. I tried— I can't—"

Oliver didn't turn around. "Stop your moaning, boy," he said darkly.

"Please," he said, reduced to begging, "_get away_."

Oliver's eyes were fixed on Claire's artery pulsing frantically in her neck and she suddenly wished that it wasn't making itself so obvious, presenting her lifeblood to him like a flashy Vegas sign. "Why should I?" he whispered. Oliver reached out a finger and ran it across her forehead that had broken out in a sweat. Claire swallowed the heart jumping in her throat. "Why should I take orders from a weakened fledgling that can barely put his words in the correct order when the promise of blood is near?" He turned his head in Michael's direction and a malevolent smile pulled at his lips.

"I beat you once, boy, and I will do it again if you get in between me and my meal."

"Michael!" Claire screamed, beginning to struggle again. "Michael, there's a bag of blood in my pocket!" But he was too far away and had no strength to even stand as he tried to move toward her to help. Michael collapsed and began dragging himself across the floor to where Oliver stood.

The vampire nearest to her chuckled, the noise dark. "And why should I want a _bag_ when there is a human sitting before me, bound to a chair, practically _begging_ to be devoured?" His thumb stroked her jumping pulse and he grinned as his fangs came down.

Oliver lowered his mouth onto her neck and Claire felt it sting before she felt darkness close around her, draping her mind in a protective cloak of numbness.

* * *

Claire awoke to the smell of tea and found she was lying down on cold stone. She sat up too quickly and became dizzy, but caught herself before she fell back onto the ground. Her vision cleared and the scene before her was almost too much.

Michael, Shane, and Eve were all bandaged up and sleeping peacefully on the ground next to her and Myrnin had a chair he must have brought from his lab. Oliver was pacing from either side of the cave restlessly. Price was sitting cross-legged on the floor with a silver collar around his neck that was linked to the ground by a silver chain. He was looking at her unblinkingly with a strangely tranquil expression on his face. Myrnin was sipping something from a little teacup while an identical one was right next to Claire; she could see the steam rising from the delicate china in swirls.

"Earl Grey."

Claire looked up at Myrnin. He raised his own cup with a slight upturn of his lips as he took a drink.

Claire eyed him distrustfully, but picked up the ceramic and sipped from it. She didn't like tea much, but the warmth of it was comforting. Claire got up slowly and moved over to Myrnin's armchair.

"Are they okay?" she asked, looking over at her friends.

Myrnin nodded. "All of them have been tended to by Oliver and myself. They've been through quite an ordeal, if what Oliver has told me is correct." Was that—_was that a smirk on his face? _Oliver hissed angrily at Myrnin and he lost the look, though reluctantly.

"It wasn't my fault, _fool_," he snarled. "You know what the bloodlust is like—it consumes all of us."

"Now, Mr. Price," Myrnin said, ignoring Oliver entirely and setting his tea on the floor at the foot of his chair. "Let's chat. Now that I've been informed of your… story… I would like to ask, _why__ Italian_?"

Claire was confused. "What do you mean?"

Myrnin became impatient. "The sidewalk, Claire, the writing on the sidewalk. '_Dammi Claire o bruciare._' Why? You're American, and you have no direct ties to Italy." He got up and walked around Price, being careful to stay just far enough that Price wouldn't be able to touch him should he decide to lash out.

"Italians," Myrnin said, "walk with their shoulders tucked in and their hands in their pockets so as to take up less room when they pass others—they are considerate. Your chest is out, your shoulders are back, and you are not exceptionally thoughtful of others, which I would assume means you haven't been to Italy for a particularly long amount of time, am I correct?"

The vampire's eyes widened, pretending to show him being impressed by Myrnin's deductions.

"You're right," he said. "But I enjoy the Italian culture and there is a story I heard that I was infatuated with. Shall I begin?" he asked, a dangerous amount of propriety in his tone.

Myrnin sat back down in his armchair and crossed his legs, his body language silently mocking Price.

"There was a woman," he began, "who ruled the ocean from an island off the coast of Italy. She controlled the tide, the fish, and the skies above the water.

"While her true subjects were the elements as were the creatures below the waves, she indirectly dominated the Italians on the land, and she was very aware of this fact. The people knew this too, and they despised her for it. For whoever controlled the water also controlled the people.

"Sometimes they caught a glimpse of her—their tyrannical queen—and they found the only way to describe her was a beautiful maiden, so young she looked to be adolescent. This couldn't be true, however, because this woman had been controlling the sea for generations. The small island was far, a long distance to travel by boat, and the townspeople knew that if they tried to get there, they would be rewarded with a storm and no fish for a week.

"One man, a fisherman, felt wronged by this woman who evilly played with the town whenever she so desired. So, this man decided to speak to her himself.

"He took his boat and fought against the storm she sent for him. He was a skilled mariner and used his abilities to make it to the island. The woman came out of the brush, seemingly to greet him, and looked him dead in the eye. The fisherman stood to get out of his boat, but as he did, the island vanished before him and fog rolled in, surrounding him in a white darkness.

"The water grew still and became smooth like glass. He looked into the water and saw something he would never forget: himself staring back at him with dead eyes and a noose around his neck.

"An echoing voice said, 'The only way to defeat me is to destroy the moon and you could never possibly do such a thing.' She laughed and the sound resonated against the walls of fog.

"The fisherman knew what he had to do. He was going to permanently blacken the night sky, no matter what it took."

Leo Price was rubbing the scar on his forehead above his left eyebrow absently. He added as an aside quietly, "And I intend to destroy Amelie's moon."

Myrnin laughed loudly, his guffaws bordering on obnoxious. "I've heard that story," he said, "and that is _not _how it ends."

Hate shone in Price's narrowed eyes. It seemed that he knew what Myrnin was talking about.

"Would you like to hear it, Claire?" he said loudly, raising his voice but not taking his eyes from the man chained to the floor in front of them. Claire nodded slowly at his question, letting him continue. "Very well."

"The foolish fisherman tried many things to strip the sky of its moon. He blew the clouds in front of its light; he climbed the tallest mountain and threw the ink of a squid into the air, but to no avail. He tried night after night to destroy the planet that hung in the sky, but was only let down each time he tried.

"Upon returning home for the night after another failed endeavor, the man caught the reflection of the midnight sun in the still water. In a final attempt, he waded out to the reflection and covered the rippling image of the queen's power source with a large piece of driftwood and a scream split through the quiet night. The water started to bubble around him and he began to retreat from the ocean, but a powerful wave pulled him back.

"The fisherman was gripped by the hands of the ocean and he was dragged below. He looked in the direction of what he believed to be up and saw the piece of wood floating away. The moon's rays were dancing all around him, taunting him and his loss.

"A glowing began in front of him as he began to drown and the woman's face came into view. Her hair was floating around her face and as she grew closer, it reached out and wrapped around his throat.

"'How dare you,' she said, her voice penetrating his mind. 'You believe you can just so easily ruin me when my sons and daughters surround you, lapping against your body, threatening to take you every moment you're within the reach of my power? The waves protect me. If you seek to destroy me, my children will resist you!'"

Myrnin leaned back in his chair and sipped from his cup. "And that is Morganville as well, sir. We will fight for Amelie."

Price's fangs went down. "Your town is weak, and your Founder is a poor leader. Look at the foolish men she appoints as her second," he snarled, jerking his head in Oliver's direction. "They practically _allow _themselves to be captured."

Oliver growled at him. "Watch your tongue, boy, or I will rip it from your throat."

Myrnin found humor in Price's quip and he expressed his enjoyment with a laugh. He seemed to be reveling in the fact that he was the only one who had not been directly involved up until that point. He thought he was the only one who hadn't, so far, dirtied their hands.

But he had taken Claire's phone and _given it to this madman_—_to Price! _Claire nudged him with more force than was necessary. "Get back to it," she demanded.

Myrnin calmed down and cleared his throat, settling himself in his chair. "Yes, well—"

"_Dogs_," Price spat with venom in his voice. "You're all dogs. She has you on a tight leash and when she lets go of that, you'll have no idea where to go."

Myrnin surprised Claire by becoming serious and saying, "Perhaps you are right." Oliver's pacing stopped abruptly, a low, warning rumble of a growl in the back of his throat. "Perhaps we won't know what to do. But it would be better to die by her side than to _ever_ betray her."

Out of the corner of Claire's eye, she saw Oliver resume his endless walk from one side the cave to another and heard him make a noise of agreement.

"She's trained you well," Price said with hate.

"Not well enough, it would seem."

Myrnin's head swiveled around and Oliver's snapped up. Claire felt herself go dizzy again. That voice.

Amelie.

* * *

**Really sorry it's been so long, but big thanks to _blurs of red and blonde_ for being the beta of this chapter because I had no motivation to edit this. I'd also really appreciate feedback, thanks.**


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